


All The Flowers In The World

by getoffmybarricade



Category: Les Miserables
Genre: Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Transphobia, Insecurities, M/M, Modern AU, Non-Binary Jean Prouvaire, Trans Montparnasse, traveller Montparnasse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-17
Updated: 2020-08-17
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:15:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25945696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/getoffmybarricade/pseuds/getoffmybarricade
Summary: there is a man and he does not have a name because if he does he cannot escape his past.He can’t escape the way the name was screamed, the disgust and hate that used to seep into it, the sharp sting of his mother’s palm connecting with his face
Relationships: Montparnasse/Jean Prouvaire
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	All The Flowers In The World

There is a man who does not have name. 

A name ties you to responsibility, it keeps you stuck in one place. A name can be thrown around and dirtied just as quickly as it can be glorified and praised, and nothing you do can stop that. 

A name doesn’t meet how he sees himself. It’s false and it isn’t his, no matter how many people try to tell him it is. Because he doesn’t fit his reflection. He doesn’t fit the body he lives in. 

A name means that people can define you by the way you just roll off of their tongues. They know who you are and they think they know more than you know yourself. 

Because everyone has a name, right? 

It’s just the way life is. 

But there is a man and he does not have a name because if he does he cannot escape his past. 

He can’t escape the way the name was screamed, the disgust and hate that used to seep into it, the sharp sting of his mother’s palm connecting with his face. There is a scar above his left eyebrow that she put there and each time he looks at it all he can hear is the mirthless laughter that would follow her hissing a name that didn’t belong to him. 

He can’t escape the way people assume they know who he is because they caught a glimpse of his past. His name connects to his face, his face to his life and then everyone knows he is. They know who he is before he does. They know he is ‘not normal’ and that he is ‘strange’ and ‘distracted’. They know he can’t concentrate and they know he can’t look his mother in the eye. 

They don’t know he is breaking, the walls he put up are crumbling from the inside and he doesn’t know how to stop them. The name pounds against his skull like a drum and it can’t be his, it can’t be, because he hates it so much. 

So he disappears. 

He leaves behind the ghosts of a past that will perhaps forever haunt him. The cries that echoed in his mind at night, always his own, and the shadow of a city that could never let him live as himself. 

Each place he visits holds its own special memory and he takes their names instead. He takes London because he’d visited it on his birthday one year, a day that had never meant anything to him before. And that might someone had released fireworks into the sky, their colours erupting in bursts of crystal blue and pink and he’d felt, for the fist time in his life,  _alive_. 

He remembers the way they appeared out of nowhere. One moment an explosion of brightly coloured lights that lit up the whole city, and the next no more than a few embers settling back over the city. 

No-one questioned their arrival, just like no one questioned the way a man appeared in the city with its name as his own. 

He takes Brooklyn after he watches the sun set over a garden where so many have walked. He thinks of a time where people rose up against the unfairness and inequality that held them down, joined together to make a stand, and he remembers vowing to do the same. 

The sky had been streaked with the most beautiful of promises, each shade carefully painted with the colours of the world and displayed for the world to see. He remembers his friend that died a few days before and wondered if it had been her last work of art. It is often said that when an artist dies, they are able to paint the sky one last time. He kept her memory and the setting sun in his heart and the name in his mouth. 

And of course there had been countless others; Paris and Montego and Pireas and so many others that held a special place in his life. He remembers acts of kindness shown and the melodic voice of a man singing in the streets. The sunrises on rooftops and flowers that grew beneath his feet, all showing him that there was good in the world. There was good in his world. 

He often wonders when he will settle on one last place, one last memory he could savour. And it comes to him one night, deep into the velvety dark of the latest hours with nothing but the stars above him; he would rest when he had all the flowers in the world. 

Flowers grew even in the darkest of times, the rain making their petals bloom even when it seemed like nothing could lift the heavy sadness. And when he found his light, his hope, his joy...then he would settle. 

He didn’t find his answer quickly. Or easily. It was a struggle of battles with his mind that he thought he was going to loose, resisting urges that fought so hard to take over him. 

And he remembers seeing his light in the midst of the storm. Right there, stood underneath the soft lights in the early evening, auburn hair flowing in the gentle breeze, the sweet sound of their delicate voice filling his ears. 

Jehan Prouvaire was his world, his heart, his joy. 

They sung with the softest of voices, each word filled with so much meaning that it was impossible to look away. They spoke with passion, green eyes lighting up in a way that he always wished his own could, and they saw the good in him. 

They didn’t care about his flaws and his stitched up scars, they didn’t care if he wasn’t completely whole. They loved him. 

And when they realised that he too longed for a new world, one where people weren’t selfish and cruel, one where they could accept and learn to love, see past the way someone looks and realise what was inside, they showed him it. 

They showed him it in the form of a messy bunch of friends who fought with words strung into gold, peace brushed into every one of their ideals. They were young, but so was he, so was Jehan. So were most of the people who wanted change. Age doesn’t define you. Only you define yourself. 

And he realises that he doesn’t need all the flowers in the world. 

Because he already has them. 

Jehan with his purity and intrepid mind. Enjolras with his eyes that burn with passion. Eponine who battles hrough her storms even in her fiercest hours. Joly who showers others with his care even if he takes away from himself. 

And for once in his life he finally feels free. Hopeful. New. 

There are no weights dragging him down, no taunting and hurtful words plaguing him because these people, they understand. Jehan understands. 

And Jehan takes his hands in their own delicate ones, covers the shaking of them by lacing their fingers together. They whisper softly and don’t promise anything because they know life is uncertain. But they are always there, always ready, and he couldn’t love them more. 

And he finally has somewhere to call his own; a place that reminds him of everything he loves about himself and the world. The place he’s spent so long searching for his whole life. 

Montparnasse had a name, an identity. 

He was alive.

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! Thank you for reading! 
> 
> This is loosely inspired by a headcannon I saw on tumblr a few days ago and I thought wow, that’s deep  
> I’ve never really written anything Montparnasse centric before purely because I don’t know much about his character (sorry?!) so I hope this was okay 
> 
> Please drop a comment if you enjoyed this because they give me so much motivation and I love to know how you thought it was 
> 
> As always, thank you :)


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